Global outsourcing of carbon emissions 1995–2009: A reassessment

Baumert, Nicolai; Kander, Astrid; Jiborn, Magnus; Kulionis, Viktoras; Nielsen, Tobias

doi:10.1016/j.envsci.2018.10.010

Cited by 58 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…The withdrawal of the US from the Paris 37 agreement has revived an interest in the adjustment for carbon prices on the border (Chang, 2017). The 38 increasing shift of resource extraction and manufacturing to developing countries raised questions 39 about effects of domestic policies on the level of global emissions and the responsibility for emissions 40 associated with internationally traded products (Baumert et al, 2019;Kander et al, 2015). Scientists 41 quantified emissions and resource use associated with the production of internationally traded 42 products (Kanemoto et al, 2014;Liddle, 2018;Peters and Hertwich, 2008), while economists and legal 43 scholars proposed and investigated border tax adjustments or other measures targeting traded 44 products (Ismer and Neuhoff, 2009;Trachtman, 2017).…”

Section: Introduction 32mentioning

confidence: 99%

Carbon fueling complex global value chains tripled in the period 1995–2012

Hertwich

2020

Energy Economics

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11Complex global value chains are those involving more than two countries and imply that a country 12 imports products as capital goods or intermediate inputs to the production of its exports. When tracing 13 the life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of traded products, for example for border carbon 14 adjustments, such emissions are counted at each border crossing. The prevalence and dynamics of this 15 phenomenon have been poorly understood. This paper shows that GHG emissions associated with the 16 production of imports used for producing exports have risen rapidly from 1995, peaking in 2012 and 17 declining slightly to 2016. They now constitute a total of 4.4 PgCO 2 equ. or 10% of global emissions. The 18 most important exported products in terms of emissions associated with imported inputs are chemicals, 19vehicles, machinery, and information and communications technology (ICT). Crude petroleum, iron and 20 steel, chemicals, and ICT components are the imported products being used for this export production. 21A driver analysis indicates that in industrialized countries, the declining domestic value added in exports 22 and increasing share of exports in GDP have contributed most to this development, while in emerging 23 economies, the growth of GDP itself has been an important driving factor, while declines in the energy 24 intensity of export production have provided a weak counterbalance. The importance of transiting 25 carbon raises questions of how climate policies affect industrial competitiveness and how border tax 26 adjustment would account for such emissions. 27 28 2 Keywords: Emissions embodied in trade; carbon footprint; multiregional input-output analysis; 29 EXIOBASE; trade in value added (TiVA); index decomposition; complex global value chains. 30 31

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Section: Introduction 32mentioning

confidence: 99%

Carbon fueling complex global value chains tripled in the period 1995–2012

Hertwich

2020

Energy Economics

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“…Other studies have questioned this conclusion [10][11][12][13][14], showing that the observed imbalances between developing and developed countries regarding emissions embodied in trade may largely stem from differences in technology between countries, i.e., differences in carbon intensity of energy and energy intensity of production, rather than from outsourcing.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The downside of this is, of course, that countries are no longer accountable for the effects of sourcing of imported good. This slightly modified version of technology adjustment was used in two studies of the balance of emissions embodied in trade for the UK and Sweden 1995-2009 [10] and the world 1995-2009 [13]. The technology-adjusted balance of emissions embodied in trade measures emission flows due to the scale and composition of exports and imports only, and is hence a more reliable indicator of outsourcing of emissions than the standard balance of emissions embodied in trade, which includes the effects of technology differences between countries.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Consumption versus Technology: Drivers of Global Carbon Emissions 2000–2014

2020

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This study utilizes recently published environmental extensions to the World Input–Output Database (WIOD) to compare production-based, consumption-based and technology-adjusted carbon emissions for 44 countries and country groups for the period 2000 to 2014. Results show some significant shifts in global emission trends compared to similar studies of the period before 2009. For 20 European Union (EU) countries and the US, emissions decreased over the period regardless of measure, and the same was true for the EU. Since GDP grew in 18 of these countries, the results provide unambiguous evidence for absolute, albeit modest, decoupling of economic growth from carbon emissions. The large increase in global emissions that nevertheless occurred during the period was driven almost entirely by increasing consumption in China and developing countries.

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“…This accounting method, unlike PBA, incorporates emissions embodied in international trade, which takes a significant share in global emissions. CBA assigns emission responsibility to the country where a product is finally consumed irrespective of where along the global value chain emissions physically occurred (Baumert et al, 2019). According to recent studies, up to 25-30% of global emissions are generated from international trade (see Karakaya et al, 2018).…”

Section: Data Type and Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Is Carbon Decoupling Likely to Happen in Africa: Evidence from Production and Consumption-Based Carbon Emissions

Tenaw

2020

Preprint

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Abstract Background Decoupling is a green growth concept suggested as a means to achieve economic growth without or with less environmental risks. Despite extensive empirical studies made on decoupling between emissions and growth, the existing evidence is quite mixed and inconclusive. On top of that, the vast majority of studies considered emissions generated at the point of production alone which do not explicitly account for emissions associated with international trade. Accordingly, this study examines the issue of decoupling between carbon emissions and economic growth in 25 African countries over 1990-2017, considering both production and consumption-based CO2 emissions. Results The results from decoupling method and panel data estimation techniques invariably indicate some evidence of relative decoupling for production-based emissions, but no robust evidence of decoupling for consumption-related emissions. Primary energy intensity and population are found as the main drivers of carbon emissions in Africa. Further, exports and imports have insignificant effects on territorial emissions, but significant and offsetting effects on consumption-based emissions. Conclusion The main conclusion of the study is to incorporate emissions generated from consumption activities in emissions-growth linkage as production-related emissions alone would evidently be insufficient for decarbonizing economic growth. The study also suggests that climate policy measures in Africa are not fully-effective in mitigating carbon emissions and hence the need for enforcing active policy interventions and consumption-related emissions regulation in particular.

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Global outsourcing of carbon emissions 1995–2009: A reassessment

Cited by 58 publications

References 14 publications

Carbon fueling complex global value chains tripled in the period 1995–2012

Carbon fueling complex global value chains tripled in the period 1995–2012

Consumption versus Technology: Drivers of Global Carbon Emissions 2000–2014

Is Carbon Decoupling Likely to Happen in Africa: Evidence from Production and Consumption-Based Carbon Emissions

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